CIO Research Study: Building the Foundation for AI-Ready GTM Data

Executive Summary

The CIO’s new mandate: AI-powered revenue

AI is rewiring enterprise revenue growth, and the CIO is now at the center of it. 

Enterprises are moving from experimenting with AI to driving business outcomes, with agentic AI as a direct path to measurable ROI. However, to lead in this new era, CIOs must focus relentlessly on the CEO’s priorities — growth, customer experience, cost reduction, and productivity.

Despite record AI investment, the execution gap remains wide. This research shows that 87% of enterprises missed their number in 2025, even though executive confidence was high.

We uncover why the most powerful partnership in the enterprise today is between the CIO and the CRO. This study shows nearly half of enterprises know their revenue data still isn’t AI-ready in 2025 — a critical barrier to sustainable growth.

Predictable revenue growth depends on trusted data and unified systems led jointly by CIOs and CROs. This Clari + Salesloft research, conducted in partnership with Censuswide across 400 enterprise CIOs, CROs, and VPs of Sales, RevOps, and IT, (no Clari + Salesloft customers) captures that transformation in motion.

Key Findings

1. The CIO as a strategic revenue partner

Just as CIOs have long guided security and infrastructure, they are increasingly shaping the systems, data, and AI that power modern revenue operations. By partnering closely with revenue leaders, CIOs help ensure these capabilities scale effectively and support sustained revenue growth.

• 87% of enterprises miss revenue targets despite record AI investment
• 96% agree that forecast accuracy improves when CIOs are directly involved
• 89% expect the CIO’s role in forecasting to expand over the next year

2. AI is exposing cracks in enterprise GTM data

AI promised a B2B revolution. Instead, it’s exposing the cracks and complexities across enterprise GTM data.

• 48% of revenue leaders doubt their data is AI-ready
• Only one-third of RevOps leaders say they fully trust their forecast data
• 55% report conflicting pipeline signals from teams using different data sources

3. Revenue AI maturity: the investment–impact gap

AI acceleration has outpaced enterprise data governance and control, leaving most organizations still in the early innings of running revenue with AI.

• 42% of organizations lack formal governance frameworks for Revenue AI
• 78% are still in the early stages of AI adoption
• Fewer than half have automated even 50% of their revenue process

AI investment without data control delivers noise, not results. CIOs who govern Revenue AI with structured frameworks and standardized data are the ones converting potential into measurable ROI. The evidence is clear: when CIOs lead GenAI and AI transformation efforts, organizations see up to 30% efficiency gains¹.

4. The CIO and CRO partnership defines revenue predictability

• 98% say collaboration directly impacts revenue performance
• Yet 28% still meet only monthly or quarterly

Predictable growth requires IT and revenue to move in lockstep. But with 28% of CIO–CRO syncs occurring monthly or less, most teams are already behind. Only frequent alignment keeps revenue on track.